the keeping is not forever

Secrets are phantoms. They are terrors, even.

I have thought a lot about what to write here for a long time. About secrets. I am almost afraid to start. There are the things people tell us, the secrets shared with us, about other people. When we are trusted to be the keeper of a third party story--the person who would rather we didn't know, but we end up knowing all the same. It is just often too compelling to keep it a true secret. Secrets become trivialized the further they spread outside the center. Actions with context and explanation become reduced, like the farthest ripples of the biggest stone when it lands. And then you can't separate it from the rest of the water.

There are our own secrets. Stories about our families or our friends and experiences we have had together. Silent moments, deep hurt. Those are the things worth keeping quiet about, right? Because it takes so much to explain why these are not bad things. There are choices we make, all of us, that we don't want to talk about. So we think about them or not, depending on our style. Songs remind us of secrets. Skies remind us. And smells and words. And we hope everything passes outside of memory someday, and that we forget. But that's not the way of ghosts, really. Secrets are the most profound hauntings.

When I was in the fifth grade, my family experienced something very difficult we all had to keep secret. It was a big deal, and has certainly informed "me." I will tell you if you ask me, if you really need to know. But it's not my secret alone. So I can't give it away that easily. Many of you know it already anyway.

For all kinds of reasons that made sense for all types of realities, we all had occasion to tell lies to keep the secret. Its integrity. That was much harder than having the secret in the first place. Maintaining the fortification so it could not escape. That was the challenge. Given the scope and reach of the event, it affected so much of my daily existence that little sub-lies had to emerge. Snowballing into something greater and grander than what would have happened, possibly, if there had been nothing to keep quiet about. The burden grew like weeds. I can tell you that I have things I cannot pull out of my garden each year because their roots are too deep. And they remind me of this.

There was a day that may be remembered be one of you, too. Sitting down by the creek. The same creek where two years later I would have my first kiss. And I was wearing a shirt of my mother's, like kids do because they think some of their parents clothes are cool (before they realize this is wrong, wrong, wrong). Green and black big, art deco dice print, I think. And bad jeans with tennies. I was with a friend, and I started crying. Out of nowhere. The pressure of keeping this quiet, while dealing with all of its impacts was just too much for the little me. And the greatness of it was probably more than should have been shared with a fellow fifth grader. But I told her anyway. Just to have someone else hear it. Like I was shifting the burden. Roll it up the hill with me, will you?

This person I told, this child who is now a woman, was very kind. And I remember never speaking of it with her again. But I knew that she knew, and it was just fine. She may have told someone else. And that's just fine, too.

I told other people after that, with a measured choice that surprises me. But I was always expecting the world to fall down around me, you see. It felt like betrayal to not have a secret anymore.

But it wasn't.

Because it happened to me, too.

At the end here, I often don't know where to go. I am left creating an epilogue, translating these memories into a way I will behave going forward because I want so much for my daughter, the only child I have, the only child I ever want to understand a way to be in the world that is strong and honest. A way to be that is without secrets that weigh you down.

My darling, if you keep writings of your own--any reflections or sussing out of the world--someday your children will read it. As you will read mine. Near the lamp from my teenage room and the books you avoid as you reach for my glasses.

Every way you act in the world in some way belongs to the world.

You can have thoughts. You can have private thoughts that no one knows.

Actions are owned by the many. The everything. You can make mistakes. You can do what you want at the time, and you should. There is, in many cases, no other way to learn. Be stronger than the secrets you make for yourself. Outlast them with the choices you have yet to print upon who you will be. Never be afraid of your worst day; the day you answer for it...that is when the freedom comes.

needed

My daughter is curious. She is 13 months old and passionate about discovery. Like most new people in the world. I don't remember a time when she wasn't this way, so growing up together thus far has been void of her seeming to need me for much. She loves me to be sure. She loves with her whole body, throwing herself on me and rolling around. But most of the time, she just wants to do her own thing. And I can watch if I want to. She'll love me as part of her play.

Her curiousness is not confined to stuff. She loves people, too. A flirt. At breakfast, she smiles and waves "Hi" to strangers. She even taps people on the back. When she went to her newest daycare--her third--they warned us that we may have to pick her up early on the first day, to maintain her sense of security. There was no phone call. She introduced herself to everyone and everything was just fine.

This morning we went to the doctor for her several month check-up. The nurse we see is lovely. "I love big babies," she says. "It's good for them." Undress, weight, height. Back to the room to wait for the actual physician.

Her doctor is an interesting character. A Boomer. Jeans somewhat pegged and plaid flannel showing where the cuffs turn up. We saw him walk past us in a leather jacket once. He has mentioned that he goes to the gym, and tells me that he hates our governor as much as I must, because he knows where I work and knows how brutal it has been with the budget cuts. A mix of familiarity and a bedside manner from, perhaps, the 1940s. He's sweet, really.

The point of this description is to let you know there is nothing strange about him. He's a normal person. With a medical degree.

My daughter was playing near me but not on me. Reading books. Talking and making cow noises. In walks the doctor.

And she loses her cotton-picking mind. Complete and total meltdown. Planets exploding in her eyes.

I laughed in disbelief. I couldn't help it. I was thunderstruck. She reached for me and held onto me like a cub, clinging her paws on the undersides of my arms. I couldn't even turn her around without her wailing. He listening to her chest and said loudly above her cries, "You look like you played volleyball!" "I did!" I said. Really, is was just my freshman year, and I wasn't good. At all. He kept asking me sports questions and I answered back, gently holding her down as he examined her further for whatever she is supposed to be. We were talking at a loud yell over the tomato-faced cub. Which was interesting, because I currently don't have a voice. It has been taken temporarily, I assume, by some viral illness or something. I wasn't yelling at the Olympics.

It was over. At least that part. Next were the shots, but a reprieve before. Us alone in the room. Me and her.

She held me close and I held her back. I pressed my hand to the side of her head to move it closer to my chest. I swayed a little and because I can't talk, I whispered a song to her. Her breathing slowed. I moved my hand to her back and noticed that her head stayed just as tightly pressed as if I had been forcing it there. The niceness of this moment. The need I felt from her, there was almost a sense of guilt at my joy of being needed while she feared the world that has always been her pearl. I felt so much a mom. It was so nice.

The rest of the visit was tough for her as well. And I coaxed her into comfort and back into her clothes. "Time to go to school," I said. I wondered if I would need to take her home and hold her tightly again. Maybe she was too traumatized to be apart from me. I'll drive here there and see how it goes. One foot in front of the other has always been my motto. One foot in front until you fall down.

We arrived at daycare. Step one and two and three. Into the bungalow. Washed her hands. Four and five and six.

"She went to the doctor this morning. It was a little rough."

"Well, she seems fine now."

I looked at her fully then. She was playing far away from me again. I started to walk away.

"Bye!" The enthusiastic familiar jewel she gives me and everyone else.

The phantom embrace was still there. I felt it, warmer than the sun that fell around me. The only sun there is to feel.

bite thy tongue

When I was a kid, I thought living in this state was a stroke of great fortune because of the changing seasons. Specifically, the snow. We get snow. A lot of snow. With this comes the cold, but this wasn't something I ever really noticed, probably because I was kept warm by sugar, emotions for which I had no conduit, and moon boots. I loved the snow and couldn't imagine living in a place where it was green and brown all year round. It made me feel lucky. And little hipper than warm climate dwellers.

To be young. To be young and totally insane.

My adoration for the seasons has waned, a direct inverse relationship to my age. I started to give myself tricks to keep appreciating things. "Anyone can be creative when it's warm; it takes true genius to have a great idea in the winter." Or I would force myself into a moment of awe as we drove past the river, the trees creating a decadent, diamond arch above our passage. This majesty was only present immediately following a snowfall, lasting all of about 24 hours before it became a bunny flop of dirty mess. And then it was just cold again.

I have lost my appreciation for the beauty of winter and the snow. It represents exhaustion. Responsibility. Agony. It feels like death. I'm tired of being stuck in the road, stuck in my house, wet feet. No one holding hands because it's too hard with gloves. No faces seen through scarves. Pale and repetitive. There's this scene in Fargo where Steve Buscemi is burying the money in the middle of nothing. He looks around, making a mind map of his surroundings so he can return for the loot in a scene or two. To his left: a blanket of nothing. His right: a mirror image of the left and everything around and besides is all the same. He takes the red window scraper he has used to dig a shallow hole, and plants it there. An angry scar. A desperate, hail mary hope that he'll be able to get back to this same spot that looks like everything else in its description of "eternal sameness."

That's pretty much how I feel. I do not feel creative enough to appreciate what is happening around me. I feel the same as yesterday.

I have to take a different approach. I have to do something that I generally try to avoid, because I feel like this strategy is placing an undue burden on someone who can't quite speak for herself yet. Using her for something I need without her consent. But I've got to do something. So I turn to my daughter. And I use her.

She is just starting to marvel at the white blanket around her. We took her sledding once, and she drug her hand along the sidewalk, leaning into the puff. She has seen it snow, and laughed. She is just starting to get it. Next year will be better; she'll be able to play more, and will understand but a bit more about the importance of wearing a hat and gloves. She'll start to saturate her mind with the possibilities of this season.

It will be different with this than with other things I have discovered again with her as though it were the first time. Because she cannot make me like it. Because I don't. It's not like pasta or cheese or animals. But there will be this brief time in her life when the snow means something else to her. A gift from this land, from Kepler, dendritic and singular. So I will learn to keep my head level. Not curse at biting wind. I will give her space to discover what it means for her, and let her learn to tell herself whatever stories she wants about the remarkable nature of the earth. I won't destroy the possibilities for her with my own developed, prejudiced mind.

It means something, this. Letting something be special for someone. Even when you think otherwise.

tell me

I have a vibrant love affair with change. I get bored with frightening ease. I don't pay attention to that many things for that long because I'm afraid I'm missing something else. Must shift the attention so I don't lose a moment over there, let me tiptoe to see. I like to have ideas and thoughts and share them with people and hope that they take flight. And then I like to go about my way to something else.

I have a couple of uncles. When I was a kid, one of them used to have a trick for getting me to calm down in my hyper-extended fury of doings. He would gently touch his thumbs and pointer fingers together, making somewhat of a Hershey Kiss-shaped triangle, and he would say in a slow breath, "Mellow." I also had a teacher who forbade me from eating sugar.

For someone who moves around a lot, I do actually listen. I like to listen. And I'm highly impressionable. So I took the mellow very seriously, confident that it had an actual impact on my vibes. It's a strange mix of superstition and, even in this, a want to be different in five minutes. I don't have to be hyper all the time, that would get old. I can be chill, too. I can be anything for a little while.

The older I get, the more intentional I am about directing the frantic me into appropriate channels, and the greater desire I have to work on things until they are at a seeming state of "done." Since I have become a mother, this re-routing of energy has become more important, because I want my daughter to be able to focus on something. Like homework (which I almost never did). I want her to be able to be satisfied sitting still and dwelling on a problem without drifting off into contexts and connections. At least I think that's what I want. I'm not at all certain what she has in mind for herself. She may have other ideas.

I place so much value on the things that I can't or don't do. If I can do it, it must not be important. I have tried to talk myself out of this logic, but that is something I'm really not good at. Because I will listen to everyone before I listen to myself. This probably stems as much from a desire to make people happy as it does to change. Whichever comes first in that equation, I'm not sure. Another post another time. The point is I see other people being focused. Doing math. Keeping a really clean house. I think about the things I am good at: change and listening. Following orders which leads to change, even if it's becoming someone's vision of what you should be. When I was in labor, the nurse commented on how perfectly I did exactly what she told me to do, causing my husband to say, "She would be great in the Army."

There's a line in a movie (always points if you know which one). A woman is introducing her boyfriend to all her friends and the dialogue goes something like, "This is Jack. He's an artist, but right now he works at a bank." "This is Charlene, she's in real estate, but she's really a dancer." After several of these exchanges, the boyfriend says this:

"Let me ask you something; why is it all your friends are on their way to becoming somebody else?"

In those words I sit, anxious but peeking around the corner of the phrase. So wonderful to dream and imagine who I am going to be when I grow up. So frightening to wonder that I am not yet somewhere I might be. I could, and probably will, do this for the rest of my life. But I will sit still, making the mellow sign, and tell myself who I am as though I have traits locked firmly to my every action and blink, that are with me even when I'm being a good soldier. If I could choose who I am and what I would do in a future yet-to-be-determined, these things, I would take them with me. The me who can be someone else but will show you how to make the mellow sign. The me who wants to hear what you have to say and is so interested in you, for real. The me who asks questions to understand and remembers what you said the next time I see you. Who wants to look at pictures of people I have never met because you want to show them to someone, and I feel lucky. And it is this me who daydreams with you on the cloud of your choice, about the person you will be someday, too.